The Whispering Kit
by Steve the Icecube
Summary: Coalkit is an almost normal kit. She lives in WindClan, has a sister and a brother. She never met her father, but everyone seems to hate him and her mother anyway. But then something happens and someone wants her dead... Join the kit who has been abandonned my StarClan as she finds all she never had. AU to In the Shadows, Full of Hurt, companion to Hiding in the Dark.
1. Chapter 1

**AN: This is a parallel to Hiding in the Dark, and an AU of a future fanfic, In the Shadows, Full of Hurt.**

My eyes hurt. They hurt, Tawnythorn. It's all bright, and there's brown in front of me.

I nuzzle it, and squeak in shock. You're the brown thing, Mama? I smell your milk.

I tip my head up, and get a glimpse of a white body beside me through my shaking eyelids. Who's that?

I look up more, and see yellow orbs in front of me.

Your face smiles, and I smile back. "Mama?" I ask, my voice quivering.

"Yes, Coalkit."

"Who's that lying on me?"

Tawnythorn laughed. "That's your littermate, Blizzardkit. He's sleeping now, but soon he'll be awake too."

Blizzardkit shifted, and fell off of me. He too opened his eyes slowly, complaining. He yawned, and looked at me.

"You're Coalkit, right?"

I nodded, and looked round as I felt something move. Brown and white fur shifted, and the kit opened her eyes.

"Mama?" She mewed.

"Yes, Mosskit?" So... This kit was my sister, Mosskit.

Mosskit's whiskers were quivering. "What's the cold thing next to me?" She asked.

I peered over my sister's back, my neck stretching. Over Mosskit's back was another kit. He was black and white, patched. He was definetly asleep, and there was a red cut on his leg.

I rasped my tongue over that spot on my own leg, only for the sharp taste of something that was not milk to fill my mouth. "Ugh!" I spat the taste out of my mouth, but it lingered.

"Coalkit?" Tawnythorn mewed, looking anxiously from licking my sleeping brother.

"What's on my leg?"

She looked surprised. "It's bleeding again!" She fretted, and another head rose in a nest beside us.

"Tawnythorn?" The bleary voice mewed. I looked, and it was a brown cat. Two kits slept by her belly. One was light brown, slightly lighter than her mother.

The other was white and red, and he seemed to sleep fitfully.

"What's wrong?" Her voice asked again.

"Could you get Orangepelt for me? Coalkit and Swiftkit's wounds are bleeding again."

The cat nodded and roused her kits, telling them that she would be back soon. As she exited the den, they looked at us curiously.

"Are you Blizzardkit?" The light brown one asked my brother. He nodded and puffed out his chest.

"Who are you?" He asked.

"I'm Rabbitkit, and my brother there is Redkit." She indicated her brother.

I smiled at him. "I'm Coalkit."

He smiled nervously.

**AN: And... Crappy ending**


	2. Chapter 2

"It's fine, Tawnythorn." A ginger cat soothed, as she entered the nursery. "All wounds bleed."

"But kits don't get battle wounds!" Tawnythorn protested. The ginger cat looked at my mother.

"Tawnythorn, do you have any faith in what Blizzardstream taught me?"

My mother looked down, and something wet hit the ground. The ginger cat quickly licked her ear comfortingly.

Nearby, a brown and grey queen shook her single kit awake.

He rose, and I gasped as he towered above me. _You're huge!_

"You're tiny." He mewed bluntly.

"Well, _I _have a battle wound." I boasted.

"No you don't. You have a lump on your leg."

"Stop that, Greykit." The ginger cat scolded. "Let me take a look at your cousin."

The brown and grey cat sniffed.

The ginger cat bent down and sniffed my leg. "No infection." She mewed. "Coalkit, I'm Orangepelt, the medicine cat. I'm going to look at your leg, and put some poultice on it." I nodded as she chewed some leaves up, and put them on my leg.

"It stings!" I squealed, immediately embarrassed at the fuss I put up. "Thank you." I muttered.

Orangepelt smiled and moved on to my sleeping brother. The moment she put her nose to his flank, she gasped and picked him up in her mouth and threw him to the brown and grey cat. "Beechnose, lick him."

She hesitated.

"Now!"


	3. Chapter 3

"What is it?" My mother mewed, distressed.

Mosskit pressed close to Tawnythorn, shivering slightly in fear.

Beechnose licked the tom, and took a sharp intake of air, then carried on licking frantically. "What's happening? Who's that?" I asked.

Everyone remained silent, watching Beechnose lick.

I breathed in and out. In and out. What was happening? Why wasn't anyone talking?

Is he okay?

"Mama?" Blizzardkit mewed.

"Yes, sweetie?" Tawnythorn mewed distractedly.

"Could I have some milk?"

Tawnythorn looked over to Orangepelt. "Go ahead." The she-cat mewed. "Your other kits need you now."

Tawnythorn nodded and lay down, and we all moved in to suckle. It was the only sound in the nursery, though I could hear some cats talking outside.

After we'd suckled, Greykit asked if he could go outside, and the other three kits soon followed in doing so. Me, my brother and my sister remained in the nursery.

I didn't want to go until I knew what was happening.

We waited more moments in silence, listening to the other kits squealing outside.

After a while, the cat who went to get Orangepelt left, but she settled down once more outside of the den, maybe watching the kits.

Beechnose looked up from licking the black and white kit. "I'm sorry, Tawnythorn." She mewed quietly, her eyes down. "Swiftkit is dead."


	4. Chapter 4

**AN: So... Swiftkit just died, and then my computer broke for ages. Sorry guys.**

Mama seemed sad. I don't understand. Mama looked up and wailed. It hurt my ears a bit. Why is Mama sad? She doesn't need to be sad, right?

"Mama, why are you sad?" I asked, nudging her flank. She sighed and laid down.

"Come on, kits. Sit down." Mama sounded very tired, and we did what we were told. "I need to tell you about StarClan."

"What's StarClan?" Mosskit chirped. I heard Greykit snort outside, and his mother shushed him.

"StarClan are our ancestors." My mother began "Orangepelt, the medicine cat, talks to them sometimes. Leaders and other important cats do, too. When a cat is called to join StarClan, they leave their bodies and become young again, and they can't come back. We don't see them again, because StarClan has told them it is their time. This is what has happened to Swiftkit. He has joined StarClan."

"That isn't fair!" I protested "I'm sure Swiftkit didn't want to go to StarClan!"

"No, Coalkit, but it was his time. His wound won't hurt him anymore." Tawnythorn mewed, sighing. "Now, would you like to see camp?"

"Yeah!" Blizzardkit cheered.

We stepped outside. I was right, it is lighter out here, but I got used to it quickly. There were quite a lot of cats in camp, bustling around. A ginger and white tom was sitting on a high rock ledge. "We were just in the nursery, with the ginger and brown tabby, Orangepelt, the brown she-cat, Sugarbreeze, and the brown and grey she-cat, Beechnose. Greykit is Beechnose and Fernclaw's son, and there were also Sugarbreeze and Brightstar's three kits, Rabbitkit, Redkit and Owlkit."

"Does Orangepelt have kits?" Mosskit asked.

Mama shook her head. "Medicine cats aren't allowed to have mates." She mewed sadly. Why was Mama sad again?

"There," Mama signalled to where the ginger and white cat was sitting, and the cave behind there, "is the Highrock. Brightstar's den is behind it. Brightstar is the leader of our Clan, WindClan. He has a deputy, Crisp-pelt. Crisp-pelt is out on patrol at the moment, I think. He's Beechnose's brother. The big patch of heather is where the warriors sleep. There's also an old fox den that they sleep in when it rains. The elders sleep under the rose bush. We have two right now, Bluetail and Gingerfoot. That dip in the earth there is an entrance to the medicine cat den and the herb storage. That's where sick cats go, and Orangepelt sleeps there. The gorse bush is for apprentices, though there aren't any of those at the moment, unfortunately. Now, go along and play with your denmates, I have to do something."


End file.
